Forever
by Lahdolphin
Summary: They didn't start when they were sixteen, not really. They started when Kirihara looked them in the eyes, asked how long they were going to make him wait, and said, "Because I won't wait forever."


**Warning: M/M/M, threesome, consensual kink, dirty talk, light bondage, time skips**

* * *

_"You say you won't wait forever on me,  
__But I wouldn't make you wait that long."_

**- "Forever" by Youngblood Hawke**

* * *

Kirihara spread-eagles on the bed in lazy search of bedmates that are not there. He attempts to kick off the sheets that tangle around him, eventually giving up. He crawls out of bed naked with only the sheet wrapped around him, and wanders out of his room and down the stairs to the main floor. He smells food before he sees it.

"I think I just got hard again," Kirihara jokes when he walks into the open kitchen. It's only half a joke. Hiyoshi looks up from his laptop and mug of coffee just to roll his eyes. Zaizen doesn't look away from what he's cooking. "What's for food?" Kirihara asks as he climbs into a stool next to Hiyoshi, sitting at the counter.

"Do you mean 'what's for breakfast'?" Hiyoshi says.

"Yeah. I forgot the word."

"You're an idiot."

Kirihara adjusts his blanket and ignores Hiyoshi. Zaizen turns around with a pan of sizzling something, which he plates then slides over to Hiyoshi. Kirihara reaches across Hiyoshi's laptop to take it, but Zaizen stabs his hand with a fork.

"Ow! Son of a bitch."

"He was here first, so he gets food first," Zaizen says. He hands the fork over to Hiyoshi.

Kirihara drools as he watches Hiyoshi cut into toast spread with orange marmalade and pancakes topped with blueberries. Damn Hiyoshi and his unnatural body clock waking him up so early on a Sunday.

"Here, Akaya," Zaizen says a minute later, putting a plate in front of him; pancakes and toast with strawberry jam. Kirihara eats like he's starving. Zaizen sits on the other side of the counter, holding cup of orange juice. "Do you have anything to do today?"

"Just running and some yoga for muscle shit," Kirihara says. "Wanna run later, Wakashi?"

"I went already."

"Fuck you."

"Too early." Kirihara bites violently into his toast. "Besides," Hiyoshi goes on, "I have to go shopping. _Someone _ate half the fridge last night."

"That'll take, like, an hour," Kirihara says.

The two bicker back and forth while they eat. Zaizen quietly drinks his orange juice, listening closely, but not adding anything. When the two have stopped eating, he gathers their plates, puts them in the sink (they can fight over who cleans them later), and disappears into his room to study.

* * *

They get together when they're sixteen and drunk off cheap beer they pitched from Zaizen's older brother. Hiyoshi is spread across the floor of Zaizen's room, his ass crushing what's left of the pizza in the box. Kirihara is lying on Zaizen's bed with the boy on top of him, their lips pressed together as they make out.

"Gross," Hiyoshi says.

Kirihara looks to the side, down at the floor where Hiyoshi is watching from. Zaizen doesn't care and continues to kiss Kirihara, only now he's kissing his neck instead of his liquor lips. Kirihara's neck is hot and covered and sweat, but Zaizen is too drunk to care.

"_Wakashi,_" Kirihara whines, drunk and smiling. "Come 'ere."

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes."

Zaizen stops kissing Kirihara's neck. "Why?" he asks Hiyoshi.

"Because it's weird," Hiyoshi replies.

"I don't think 's weird," Kirihara says. "'Cause I like you. And Hikaru. I like you both _a lot._"

Maybe it's because he's drunk, or stupid, or both, but Hiyoshi gets off the floor and joins them on the bed. Kirihara laughs, grabs hold of the back of his neck, and kisses him full on the lips. Zaizen moves over and makes room. Hiyoshi's chest gets tight, and his mouth gets wet, and his skin feels hot like lava all over.

In the morning, Kirihara's heart is broken.

* * *

It's lonely in the loft without Hiyoshi, who has work at eight as an instructor at a martial arts gym, and Zaizen, who has class at a university forty minutes away. Kirihara wakes up early (in Kirihara terms, meaning ten o'clock at the earliest), eats disgusting things his trainer tells him to, and runs. He comes back and eats more disgusting things, wishing he could eat Zaizen's cooking instead of protein powder puss, and goes to the gym where the rest of the Japanese team hopefuls are training.

He lifts weights until he can't feel his limbs, and plays tennis until he can't hold a racket, and gets no homo massages from the coach who doesn't know he's full homo. None of the team knows. Even if they did, they wouldn't except the relationship he's in.

"Wanna grab a drink, Akaya?" Hajime asks in the locker room. "Kenji and I are goin' to a bar down the street if ya wanna join."

"Maybe you could bring that girl who's always climbing you and marking you up," Kenji laughs. Hajime joins in.

Kirihara closes his locker and rolls his eyes. "I don't have a girlfriend," he says, and it's the truth.

The loft isn't empty when he comes home at six in the afternoon. Zaizen is playing video games instead of studying, and Hiyoshi is meditating by the window while listening to white noise that gives Kirihara headaches. Kirihara grabs a beer and sits next to Zaizen. It's good enough for him.

* * *

Kirihara falls for Zaizen after a tennis match. He's fifteen and Zaizen is sixteen, something Kirihara will never be over, and they're shirtless in the middle of July. Zaizen drinks blue gatorade and talks about a new game he wants, and Kirihara watches the way the setting sun burns his skin red. It'll blister tomorrow and Kirihara will laugh because he'll be just as bad off. Hiyoshi will call them idiots.

"Want to wait outside a shop with me until it's released at midnight?" Zaizen asks, meaning the video game that Kirihara's already forgotten the title of. At the same time, Zaizen hands Kirihara his gatorade because Kirihara has finished his.

"Yeah, sure," Kirihara says.

It's the way Zaizen smiles—even though he lost the match, and his skin is burning, and he still hasn't told his mom about that chem test he failed on Monday—that makes Kirihara think,

_Oh, fuck me, _

for the second time in his life.

* * *

Kirihara never knows how the three of them end up in his room, but they usually do. Sometimes it's just Hiyoshi or Zaizen, and sometimes it another's bedroom, but usually it's Kirihara's. The room is hot when it's the three of them together, and the iron frame creaks under their combined weight. The sheets scrunch and move with them, gathering when Kirihara fists them, tangling when Zaizen rolls back onto his heels to fuck someone, and sliding when Hiyoshi moves.

"I'm gonna die," Kirihara says melodramatically. Zaizen grins and slides his fingers back into Kirihara, twisting them just right to make the man moan, broken and ragged. "Oh _God_—!"

"Don't tease him," Hiyoshi chastises. Kirihara wants to scream 'hypocrite' because as Hiyoshi says that, he thumbs at the tip of Kirihara's cock, digging into the slit until it burns so good. Kirihara tugs at the bounds around his wrists, secured tightly on the slotted headboard. They don't give.

"Please, _please_," Kirihara begs. Zaizen curls his fingers and Kirihara's back arches off the bed. He can't come again, not so soon, and it's killing him. "Wakashi, Hikaru, just do something."

"Something?" Zaizen says, enjoying this far too much. He always does. He always has. He probably always will. Kirihara's voice cracks in his throat. "You'll have to be more specific, Akaya."

Hiyoshi presses so hard against his slit that it hurts, and Kirihara keens.

"Spank me, fuck me, blow me—just do _something_," Kirihara pleads.

Those grins mean nothing good.

* * *

Hiyoshi, surprisingly, is the first to say it. Zaizen is in the bathroom showering, and the two are naked on his bed. Kirihara pins Hiyoshi to the bed, on top of a used condom that makes Hiyoshi grimace, and tickles his ribs until Hiyoshi is writhing back and forth with laughter. Hiyoshi cries, his legs curling towards his chest, and his smile is hysteric.

"What are you doing?" Zaizen asks, coming back in. "Are you killing Wakashi?"

"Yes," Kirihara answers, grinning evilly.

"Then stop. I don't want to have to hide his body."

Kirihara frowns, but gives up. Hiyoshi sucks in deep breathes, pushing Kirihara off of him and sitting up.

"Why the hell do I love you idiots?" Hiyoshi grumbles.

"I heard that!" Kirihara shouts, too close to Hiyoshi's ear to be comfortable.

"Me too," Zaizen says.

Hiyoshi's face goes tomato red. "I-I didn't say anything!"

Kirihara tackles him and tickles him until he says it again, and again, and again.

* * *

Kirihara gets hungry in the middle of the night and can't go back to sleep until he eats. Sometimes, he'll go through the entire fridge and still be hungry. Hiyoshi doesn't get it. Zaizen doesn't even try to understand and just accepts it.

So at two in the morning, when Kirihara knocks on Hiyoshi's door, Hiyoshi expects it's for food or sex. He really hopes it's sex.

"I'm hungry."

"So not sex," Hiyoshi grumbles.

"What?"

"Nothing. Let me get my keys."

They let Zaizen sleep since he has a test tomorrow, and go to a twenty-four hour diner down the street. The booths have weird stains, their waitress is done with people's shit, and the entire facility smells like grease. Hiyoshi drinks burned decaf coffee while Kirihara scarfs down a plate of french toast, eggs, and bacon, and then seconds.

When Kirihara is finished, he licks his lips and finishes off his orange juice. He smiles contently and sinks into the booth. Hiyoshi taps his foot.

"Happy?" Hiyoshi asks. Kirihara nods. "Hope you brought you wallet, because I didn't."

Kirihara's look of pure panic sends Hiyoshi into a laughing fit. Kirihara shouts that he's a jerk, that they're never having sex again, but when they get back to the loft, Kirihara presses Hiyoshi up against the wall and says, "You're gonna pay for that."

Hiyoshi doesn't regret it at all.

* * *

Kirihara gets the idea during his first run of captaincy in junior high. Hiyoshi chokes on his water and Zaizen nearly drops his phone into his milkshake. Kirihara grins at them over cold french fries and cheap hamburgers.

"The Olympics?" Hiyoshi asks, like he didn't hear right.

"They have tennis in the summer games," Kirihara says.

"That's crazy. It's the _Olympics_, Kirihara."

"I don't care." Kirihara steals Hiyoshi's leftover fries. He shoves them into his mouth and says, "I'm gonna do it."

* * *

It becomes official two years before the next Olympic games: Kirihara is on the Japanese team and will play during the summer. The sex when he gets home is mind blowing. They don't even make it up the stairs. They start in the kitchen, then move to the sofa, and finish in Zaizen's room on his bed.

"I can't move," Kirihara laughs, rolling onto his side. His ass aches, his arms are sore, and he's going to have one monster of a hickey on his hip tomorrow, but it's worth it. Hiyoshi kisses his forehead, moaning contently in agreement, and Zaizen kisses the back of his neck.

"You're still an idiot," Hiyoshi says. He thumbs at Kirihara's bottom lip. "But congratulations and all that shit."

"Congratulations," Zaizen mumbles into the skin of his neck.

Kirihara is content and fucked out. He's numb in all the best ways, and refuses to leave Zaizen's bed. He finally leaves when Hiyoshi promises to ride him (he does, with slow, deep rolls of his hips until they're both shaking while Zaizen watches) and Zaizen begins making dinner in the kitchen (that's good too, but it doesn't compare).

* * *

"What's his name again?" Kirihara asks.

"Hiyoshi Wakashi," Yanagi replies.

Kirihara watches him. _Not bad_, he thinks._ His serve needs work. _

Kirihara watches as Hiyoshi Wakashi cries after being beaten by a twelve year old. He bumps into Hiyoshi afterwards on his way to the bus, and shoves his gatorade into the boy's hands. Hiyoshi's eyes are red. Kirihara doesn't mention it, even if he wants to.

"I hate purple gatorade," Hiyoshi says. "Idiot."

"Seriously?" Kirihara takes back his drink. "Screw you."

* * *

Kirihara leaves with the Japanese tennis team on Monday morning at four, before the sun has come up. They say their good-bye's the night before, in Kirihara's bed, until they had all but passed out in a lump of post sex bliss. Kirihara on all fours, Zaizen behind him and Hiyoshi's cock in is mouth; Hiyoshi sucking him off to make him come a second time after Zaizen spanks his ass raw; kissing afterwards, holding each other close because they won't be able to for four months and the idea aches more than any sexual gratification brought about by pain.

Zaizen has a test and does not wake to see him off, but Hiyoshi is awake anyways. He kisses Kirihara good-bye at the door for twenty minutes, his hands tight like they're permanently stuck in Kirihara's curls. Kirihara smells like cheap soap and Hiyoshi's shampoo since he ran out of his own last week. Hiyoshi likes that Kirihara smells like him.

"Go," Hiyoshi says, shoving him away, "before I change my mind and chain you to your bed."

Kirihara grins wickedly. "I love it when you chain me to my bed."

Hiyoshi kisses the corner of his mouth, flattens his hands over Kirihara's chest, broader than it was in high school, and pushes again with less force. "Call when you land," Hiyoshi says. "Skype if your connection isn't shit."

Kirihara doesn't promise. He doesn't need to.

"Love you, Wakashi."

"Love you too, idiot."

* * *

Kirihara cries when he loses to Hiyoshi at Finals.

It burns through his body. The crocodile tears are hot on his cheeks, and hotter on the hands that hold his blubbering inside of his mouth. His knees scrap against the court and he curls forward, wishing to disappear. His stomach turns. He wants to throw up.

Hiyoshi walks up to him, holds out his hand, and says, "Get up, idiot."

Kirihara looks up at Hiyoshi's outstretched hand, at the blush on his cheeks that's half exhaustion, half embarrassment. Hiyoshi's Adam's apple bobs when he swallows. Kirihara sobs. Hiyoshi glances down at him and looks like he wants to cry too. He waggles his fingers at Kirihara as if to say, "Hurry up."

_Oh, fuck me,_ Kirihara thinks.

* * *

Australia is hot, and scary, and beautiful, but it's not home.

"I miss you," Kirihara says, curled up on his bed, hair still wet from his shower. The hotel sheets are scratchy, but the mattress is comfy and fits his form. "I miss Hikaru's food, and running with you, and bugging you to watch bad horror movies with me so I won't get scared. I miss you guys."

"How's practice?" Hiyoshi asks. His eyes probably say something like, 'I miss you too, idiot,' but the connection is bad and Hiyoshi is blurry.

Kirihara tells him about the grueling days that make junior and high school look like a walk in the park. He swears the ice baths are going to give him frostbite, and that his legs are not part of his body anymore because he can't feel them, and that his tennis arm is twice the size of his other arm and it's ugly as fuck.

"I'm sleeping, though," Kirihara says. "The beds are better than I was expecting."

"You always sleep," Hiyoshi replies, rolling his eyes. "You fell asleep on a toilet once, remember?"

"I miss you," Kirihara repeats.

"I know."

* * *

Sex isn't what they were expecting. The first time they touch each other sober, it's beyond awkward, and Kirihara takes more elbows to the gut than he would like to admit. It's not like porn makes it. Kirihara isn't as flexible as he wants, and they can't do everything (or everyone) at the same time, and the amount of money spent on condoms and lubes is frightening.

On a Thursday afternoon on the floor of their new shitty hole in the wall loft, they stretch out on a blanket and make love. It's slower than usual, and somehow their bodies just fit together, and it's so slow that Kirihara wonders how he's feeling anything, but he's feeling everything at the same time. They don't stop kissing and touching, and when it's all over, Kirihara can't let go of Hiyoshi and Zaizen.

"Are you okay?" Zaizen asks.

Kirihara nods into Hiyoshi's chest. "Yeah," he says, words stuck in his throat. "Just really glad I met you guys."

"Stop saying gay shit," Hiyoshi says.

"I _am_ gay."

"I never would have guessed."

Kirihara smiles. Zaizen kisses Hiyoshi to shut him up.

Zaizen buys the cheapest, most questionable food from a shop down the street and makes them dinner. They eat on the floor from the pot, too lazy to unpack their plates and silverware, and argue over what furniture they're going to buy.

* * *

Kirihara isn't allowed his phone during practice, but he sneaks it out of his bag during lunch, or when he's rotating serving partners. They Skype every night, but it's still lonely, and his bed is still cold.

Sometimes, Kirihara eats his dinner in his hotel room while Zaizen and Hiyoshi eat squished together at the counter at home so they both show up on the screen. Other times, Hiyoshi can't sleep, and if they put their laptops on their pillows, it's almost like they're sleeping together again. Zaizen will keep his laptop open on his desk while he studies and Kirihara plays video games online.

Then there are times that end in dirty talk and bone numbing orgasms that leave Kirihara shaking.

"I can't," Kirihara moans as he works himself on a cheap vibrator, making all kinds of lewd sounds that he'll regret tomorrow, when his throat is sore and he isn't mindless with pleasure. He's curled up on his bed, the laptop half forgotten until he looks over and sees Zaizen and Hiyoshi. "Oh _God_."

Hiyoshi is naked, spread out of Zaizen's lap, with Zaizen's hand on the curve of his ass. Hiyoshi is staring at the sheets and even though the connection is shitty at best, Kirihara can still see the burning blush on his ears.

"You look so good," Zaizen says. He hooks his fingers into Hiyoshi, making the man curl up like Kirihara is in front of the laptop screen. "You both look so fucking good."

Zaizen moves Hiyoshi onto his back in front of him, right in view of the laptop, restraining him with a hand to his chest. Hiyoshi tries to shove that hand down to his cock, but Zaizen doesn't budge. Kirihara can see Zaizen's hand moving down between Hiyoshi's legs, drawing uncharacteristic cries from the man. Kirihara wonders if Hiyoshi is shaking, if there's swear pooled in the hollow of his collarbone, if his eyes are blow wide.

"Look, Akaya," Zaizen orders. "Look at how much he misses you. Wakashi, show him like you wanted to."

Zaizen moves his hand from Hiyoshi's chest to his jaw, turning his head. Hiyoshi whines, face flushed.

"He's not good with words, but he thought this would help," Zaizen says. "Wakashi—"

Hiyoshi moans, rough, "Shut up and move you fucking fingers, Hikaru, or I swear I will kill you."

Hiyoshi agreed to this. Hiyoshi agreed to show himself getting fucked by Zaizen's fingers for Kirihara. Hiyoshi wanted to do this because he misses him.

Kirihara turns up his vibrator and bites into the sheets.

"I'm so—_fuck_—so damn close," Kirihara says, tense and shaking with strain. "Want you both so fucking bad."

"I want to watch you two fuck each other," Zaizen says, groaning like it aches to say it. "I want you both to come until you can't anymore, then I'm going to fuck each of you senseless while the other watches. Would you like that? Fuck, Akaya, I can hear you…"

Kirihara's next moan is broken. He's wet with lube and it makes obscene noises as he moves the vibrator in and out as fast and hard as he can. Zaizen whispers filthy encouragement—you sound so good, look so good, just like that, deeper, Akaya, fuck yourself deeper.

"'s not as big as you, Hikaru," Kirihara says, grinning at the thought of being bent and half and taken by Zaizen. He twists his wrists and moans. "Oh _fuck_—"

He comes onto his chest with a whimper. He watches helplessly as his lovers touch each other, kissing and moaning as Hiyoshi rides Zaizen fast and hard until they come with Kirihara's name on their lips. The three sit there for what feels like forever, an ocean apart, breathing in different air and wishing they were somewhere else.

"Coach is gonna kill me tomorrow," Kirihara says, laughing. He reaches down to ease out the motionless vibrator, moaning. "Fucking hell. I'm so loose."

"Tell me," Zaizen says, sounding tired but interested. Kirihara isn't the only one who gets off on their dirty talk.

"Feels like you two just finger fucked me at the same time, like you did last summer, when you made me come twice before you fucked me."

"Do you feel good?"

"Yeah."

Zaizen smiles into the sheets and kisses Hiyoshi's forehead. Hiyoshi is out cold. It's not common for Hiyoshi to take on a role like that—Kirihara is more interested in being degraded and used than Hiyoshi—and Kirihara understands that he's tired. Kirihara wishes he could kiss him, too.

"Just two more months," Kirihara says. "Then I'll be home for a week."

"Then you'll be gone again. Germany?"

"Austria."

"Ah."

Kirihara cleans himself up, but leaves the chat open. Zaizen does the same. Their laptops fall asleep at some point, but it's as close as they can get to falling asleep together.

* * *

Kirihara is recruited by the pros before he finishes high school. He turns them all down, saying yes to only one: the Olympic team recruiter. He's not on the team, not yet, but it's something. The coach of the Japanese team says he expects great things from Kirihara, who grins and works ten times harder than ever before.

When they find out, Hiyoshi kisses him, and Zaizen hugs him from behind.

"Knew you could do it," Zaizen says.

"Couldn't of without you guys," Kirihara says.

"Yes, you could have, idiot," Hiyoshi says.

Kirihara begins to understand that idiot is a term of endearment—most of the time.

* * *

Hiyoshi and Zaizen get used to sleeping through the night without Kirihara there to wake them up and demand food or arbitrary sex because some dream he had turned him on. Some nights, Hiyoshi wanders into Zaizen's room after they've talked to Kirihara, and they sleep together. There's no sex, just sleeping close, because they love each other as much as they love Kirihara. Other times, they'll fuck while Kirihara watches. It's not the same and their beds are never as warm as they should be with one person missing.

Hiyoshi is meditating when Zaizen comes home from class, phone pressed to his shoulder. "Yes, yes, I'm home now," Zaizen says. "Wakashi's meditating by his window and listening to his stupid white noise."

"It's not stupid," Hiyoshi replies.

"If you can hear me, you're not meditating properly."

"Shut up."

Zaizen grins, sets his things down on the counter, and sits next to Hiyoshi. He puts the phone on the windowsill and puts it on speakerphone.

"We can both hear you now, Akaya," Zaizen says.

Kirihara doesn't talk about anything besides tennis. Hiyoshi continues to meditate, occasionally humming in response to something Kirihara says to prove he's listening. (Kirihara's over excited and it's cute, so Hiyoshi does find himself listening more than he should when meditating, but he would never admit it.) Zaizen stretches out on the floor with his homework while Kirihara talks.

"Shit, I gotta go," Kirihara says. "Love you both!"

"Love you," they drone in response.

"Also, I'm coming home a week early! Bye!"

Kirihara hangs up. Hiyoshi and Zaizen look at each other, then smile.

* * *

Kirihara watches Zaizen play video games instead of doing his homework. Hiyoshi grumbles that if Kirihara can't even pass high school, there's no way he's going to the Olympics, but Zaizen is at the boss and Kirihara isn't paying attention to Hiyoshi right now.

Zaizen's screen dies out and says 'you lose' to annoying music.

"Fuck, you were _so_ close, Hikaru," Kirihara says. He's fifteen and in love, and he only says that name when he's in the shower and not saying Hiyoshi's name (sometimes he says both). "Um," Kirihara says awkwardly.

Zaizen reloads his game. "I'll get it this time."

"Yeah." Kirihara grins. "Wakashi, come watch."

"Don't push it, idiot," Hiyoshi mutters.

* * *

Kirihara doesn't kiss them in the airport, or in the taxi, but the second they get through the front door to the loft, Kirihara pulls them both close and kisses them in turn. Hands tug on clothes and bags are forgotten at the door, and they somehow make it upstairs to Kirihara's room. The bed gives off a familiar creak when they toss Kirihara onto it, demanding he strip and hurry the hell up because they are going to wreck him.

They mean it, too.

They bend him over, smack his ass until its red and raw, and fuck him open their lube slick fingers until he's begging. Even then, they don't stop, kissing him senseless and teasing his cock until he comes over Hiyoshi's hand and on Zaizen's chin. It's been four months, but their bodies still remember one another, and their hands move without conscious order.

It's not enough. No matter what they do, it's not enough.

Hiyoshi pulls himself off of Kirihara's cock and drops to the bed. Zaizen rubs up and down Hiyoshi's chest, kissing his neck, smiling when Hiyoshi shivers at the overstimulation. Kirihara turns and kisses Hiyoshi full on the mouth, reaching down to fondle his softening cock. Hiyoshi whines.

"I love you," Kirihara says. "And I love you." He looks at Zaizen. "I love you both so much."

"Are you crying?" Zaizen asks. Hiyoshi tangles his fingers into Kirihara's hair to make the man look at them. Kirihara isn't crying, but he looks like he might. "Did we actually hurt you?" Zaizen asks. "You didn't call out the safe word."

Kirihara shakes his head, smiling. "I'm fine. I'm just glad to be home."

He hides his face in Hiyoshi's neck, breathing in sweat and fruity shampoo. The sheets feel unfamiliar in his fingers, but Hiyoshi's hand is on his neck, and Zaizen is saying something dirty that makes Hiyoshi flush red, and Kirihara is finally home.

* * *

Zaizen says he was only drunk, and Hiyoshi pretends it didn't happen. They said they needed time to think about it, to just wait a little while. Kirihara hasn't cried that hard since he lost to Hiyoshi two years ago. He is so sick in love that it physically hurts to think of them. Every time he sees them, he remembers the swollen feeling in his throat and how wet his cheeks were. But he smiles because talking to them as friends is better than not talking at all.

Two years later, and nothing has changed, but everything has changed at the same time. Their bodies are different, their tennis is different, their eyes are different.

They didn't start when they were sixteen, not really. They started when Kirihara looked them in the eyes, asked how long they were going to make him wait, and said, "Because I won't wait forever."

They didn't make him wait any longer.


End file.
